As you might expect, my receiver has no HDMI ports but has optical. What I currently do now is have my optical cable going to the receiver for 5.1 surround for my cable....when I want to play 360/PS3, I slink in behind my gear and plug the optical cable into the 360/PS3...kind of annoying but takes seconds since everything is easily accesible.

My buddy says that if I have an optical port on my tv (check) then I can run the cable from TV to Receiver and that will work for all 3 components....will it? At work so will have to try it in another hour or two..

Another option is an optical switcher....these seem pretty cheap....$10-$20....anyone on here use em?

clckworang

01-03-12, 03:59 PM

You can run your components like that. I don't know what kind of TV you have, but you would need to have at least 3 optical inputs on your TV and then the one optical output. Run all three components into your TV and then run another optical cable into your receiver.

I'm not very good with audio stuff, but I know some people here would tell you that your audio might get downgraded depending on what type of pass through your TV has. I'm sure someone could provide more details about that.

I haven't used an optical splitter, though I've considered it. I'm lucky enough to have an optical input in the front of my receiver, so I have three or four components that I just switch the cable in the front when I need it. It's not the best arrangement, but it beats fishing around the back of the receiver.

OscarBluth

01-03-12, 05:38 PM

All the TVs I've owned with optical output pull the audio from the HDMI input without requiring a duplicate input via optical. They do downgrade the signal to L/R stereo, though. I've read on AVS forum that some TVs have service menus that can be changed to pass through DD/DTS, but that's not something I've done.

Does the receiver only have one optical input? No digital coax input?

Alan Smithee

01-03-12, 06:02 PM

I have a switcher for 3 optical sources (D-VHS player, DVD recorder and PS2)- works great, no more cable swapping. My TV will output Dolby 5.1 from an HDMI source connected to it, but not DTS or uncompressed PCM. Trust me, you just don't want to do it that way.

TomOpus

01-04-12, 11:21 AM

Yeah, I would look at a switcher. It's cheap and saves wear/tear on having to move the cable each time. I think I may have used one in the past, before I had HDMI, and several components used optical for the audio.

ElementZ

01-04-12, 12:23 PM

Looking into a switcher now....what's the difference between a switcher vs splitter....I assume the spllitter always has the signals going to the receiver and the switcher you would need to "switch" on the device itself?

Spiky

01-04-12, 12:40 PM

Yes. And you want a switcher unless you absolutely will not have more than one source on at a time.